Day 10: Tuscon Gem Show - Part 2: Convention Center

About 8:30 t went out for a walk.  I left a little later and headed to the wash.  Just as I got to  the end of the parking lot, I spotted  havelina crossing the road.  then I spotted T standing there within 20 feet of the javelina.  It crossed the road and went down the path to the wash and then another appeared.  It went down to an area next to the condo complex.  t said that 6 had crossed the road and I ran back to the condo to get my camera figuring that the animal would be long gone by the time I got back.  He was still there and looked right into the camera (like he was posing) and then took off into the brush.

We slowly walked down into the wash and saw two animals on the path.  They took off into the bushes as we approached.  As we were coming back up the trail we saw several desert bunnies.  A good start for the day.

We drove off for Tucson about 9:30 and got to the Convention Center just after it started at 10:00.  We made a wrong turn and ended up at the Convention Center parking area, but decided it was worth payinng $8 for parking and went in.  there weren't many places left, but we had no trouble parking.

We got in a short line to get our tickets and had no line at all to get into the show.  It was a grand show and we spent the day wandering through the multitude of venders.  It was nice to be able to talk to the folks that actually mine the stones and make the jewlery.  We found a table outside in the food court and got some lunch.  Pretty soon a couple asked if they could sit at our table.  The wife went off to the food court and the husband talked to us.  He was a volunteer at the "free  booth."  This is the booth where youu can get free raffle tickets.  We told him we had tried that two years ago, but didn't win anything.  He encouraged us to try again.  So after lunch we went down to the free booth and got our free raffle tickets.

We had a great time but no luck with the raffle until the last one of the day at 5:00.  They called out my number.  I was so suprised.  I went to the free booth to claim my prize.  I won an Ethiopian opal.  They told me it was donated last year but no one had claimed it so they gave it away this year.  They gave me the booth number of the donor so I could go and ask about my prize.  They were nice people, surprised because the show did not tell them last year that the prize was unclaimed.

We left the Convention Center about 5:30 and headed downtown for a coffee.  Most of downtown seemed closed up but we found a small pizza slice and coffee place next to the tourist information booth which was closed.  we had some coffee and then followed the tourquoise line from the information center back to the Convention Center parking, found our car and headed home.  We stopped off at Safeway looking for some prickly pear liqueur we heard about from our tour guide yesterday.  They didn't have any, so we settles for some pre-mixed berry margarita mix and headed home to our left overs.

 Tomorrow we are off to the De Grazia Gallery in the Sun.